Crank pulley bolts

[The Pimpness Monster]

Hey ya'll,

 

I've discovered that my timing marks are waaay off, much more than could be corrected through adjusting the dist for timing.

 

If your looking down at the timing pointer front the front of engine, the marks are about 45 degrees down the pulley to the left. After maxing the dist is turned all the way counter clockwise it still was about 10 degrees away from the farthest right mark to the pointer. If that makes any sense..

 

So, I'm wondering if anyone knows the distance between the crank pulley bolts, so that I can determine if some yahoo installed it clocked wrong.

 

I Figure if the distance between the bolts matches the amount that the marks are off, I can just add some temp marks till I do my timing belt next month and correct it.

 

If not...O'boy gotta be something real fun I'm sure.

 

Thanks

[GhostPath]

VG30 crank pulley assemblies are polarized with a key and cannot be installed in other than their correct orientation.

 

What's probably happened is that the pulley has delaminated from the harmonic balancer. They're attached to each other by rubber and adhesive, and when the rubber starts cracking with age, the pulleys start to slip and your timing mark wanders around.

 

Harmonic balancer/pulley assemblies aren't very much on the aftermarket - I see them for $35-75 around here and a dealership will have it for somewhere around $160 or so. They're sold as a unit, not separate pieces. If you replace it, replace the Woodruff key or "keyway" as Nissan calls it at the same time to avoid crank wear.

 

Alternately, the key may have sheared off or the key slot wallowed out, which would allow the pulley to rotate or slip separately from the crank. This is a somewhat common issue, especially on VG30s that are ineptly serviced. If the key has sheared, you might be able to get away with just replacing the key. If the slot is wallowed out... well.... there's lots of bandaid fixes, but the only right way to fix it is to replace the crank.

Edited January 27, 2008 by GhostPath

[Cuong Nguyen]

There are 6 bolts that hold the crank pulley onto the harmonic balancer. bolts are aligned in a hexagonal shape. Remove bolts. Rotate crank pulley to correct alignment. install bolts.

 

As far as "knowing" your timing is off, does the engine run better when you adjust distributor timing advancing or retarding? You'll know if your cam timing is off when you "know" the dizzy timing is about correct and your engine is still gutless.

 

Here is a picture when I first did a timing belt on my Pathfinder many moons ago. you can see the holes where the bolts holding the crank pulley on the balancer.

 

 

I'm sure I can find some photos from when I rebuilt my VG33 motor the same thing but that photo should do you justice.

Edited January 27, 2008 by Cuong Nguyen

[GhostPath]

It's not supposed to come apart like that IIRC. The bolts are supposed to be there for reinforcement only, you're not supposed to be able to remove the pulley from the balancer:

 

[Cuong Nguyen]

Yeah, the reason being why you're NOT suppose to remove the pulley from the balancer is because there are people out there that don't mark the position of the pulley before they remove it and install it wrong.

 

edit: also, there are people who don't use a FSM and go at it like myself. hehehe. Makes learning oh so fun!

Edited January 27, 2008 by Cuong Nguyen

[GhostPath]

I don't think you're supposed to be able to remove it at all. I remember checking out the one I had with my ill-fated 93 WD21 project, and even with the bolts removed, you couldn't rotate the pulleys separately from the balancer at all - by hand, anyway. The PO of the 93 had levered off the pulleys from the balancer while changing the timing belt and had gotten stumped at that point; I'd bought a new pulley/balancer assembly.

Edited January 27, 2008 by GhostPath

[Cuong Nguyen]

I've never had a problem with removing it so far. I'm about to do another t-belt change pretty soon.

 

FSM says...

 

11. remove crankshaft pulley bolt.

12. remove crankshaft pulley with a suitable puller.

13. remove front upper and lower timing belt covers.

 

so yea, remove it as once piece.

[madhatter_xe]

I don't think you're supposed to be able to remove it at all. I remember checking out the one I had with my ill-fated 93 WD21 project, and even with the bolts removed, you couldn't rotate the pulleys separately from the balancer at all - by hand, anyway. The PO of the 93 had levered off the pulleys from the balancer while changing the timing belt and had gotten stumped at that point; I'd bought a new pulley/balancer assembly.

 

like mentioned earlier, the rubber dries out and shrinks and then the pulley will fall off the balancer or rotate on it. But if you don't pull the 6 bolts holding them together, ya got nothin to worry about. No reason to buy a new one.

[The Pimpness Monster]

Right on,

 

Thanks for the diagram and advice you guys, sounds like I may not be too bad off after all.

 

Now that I got a clue, I'll take a little closer look.

[yozsi]

is your engine running badly? maybe your dist. is off by one tooth or your balancer by one bolt or a combo of both.

[The Pimpness Monster]

is your engine running badly? maybe your dist. is off by one tooth or your balancer by one bolt or a combo of both.

 

No, that's what's so strange. It runs quite smooth, although I swear it's gotta have more power than I'm getting out of it. I hope there's more anyway. I'm not sure what the idle is supposed to be at, I seem to remember somethin like 800rpm or so. Well, mine was about 500 or so, after advancing it slightly from where it was it's back up to 800ish. It also seems to have better power, though I also removed my intake silencer tube so the increased sound could be given me some delusions.

 

I was thinkin about the walking pulley thing, but I would think that it would wander all the time right? When I've been checking it's consistent in it's marks, their just in the wrong spot.

 

I guess it may just be the dist.